Is Wlad an All Time Great?

I don't know that this heavyweight era is that weak though.

The main problem is that they're just not fighting each other. People keep complaining that heavyweight boxing is boring yet when you get matchups like Chambers v Peter, Chambers v Dimitrenko, Adamek v Arreola etc they've all been good, entertaining fights.

The alphabelts aren't helping by constantly putting out **** mandatories like John Ruiz and the WBC constantly giving Ray Austin that number 2 contender slot :-(

 

Wlad would have been competing right at the very top in any era. He's stonewall ATG.

 

Thats what I mean. Was he great? No. But he was 6'5 solid with a reach to match and genuinely athletic. Thats what we're lacking today. I mean Adamek fighting at heavyweight and being a top contender is a total and utter joke. Even an old michael grant made him look awful, imagine where he'd fare against Tony Tucker. Hell even a Bonecrusher Smith would handle him. So we're definitely lacking something, it can't be ignored.

 

My point exactly.

 

There hasn't been a fighter in history that has dominated his division without being an ATG. So on that score, yes.

People forget his earlier dominant wins over Byrd, (a young) Barrett, McCline etc. It's the pure domination that does it, not the opposition.

 

Thing about Adamek is he's won a few fights at heavyweight just based on the fact he's half way fast at heavyweight (note: He's not really blindingly fast considering he's a cruiser/former light heavy - since he's carrying so much unnatural weight). And somewhat competent skills, and again they're not great skills, we've seen how porus his defence is in the past. Thats how he's winning fights. There would be absolutely no way he'd get away with that against contenders in times gone past, just because he's got a bit of boxing ability and speed and is in decent shape. That wouldn't be anything like enough to compete at heavyweight, he'd be smashed to bits. But thats not happening, until he fights a Klitschko.

Adamek is the only argument you need to show this division is pretty weak overall. I still think Haye is clearly the third best fighter in the division and would beat Povetkin and Adamek without a problem.

 

Yes.

 

I never said Wlad wasn't a great though, I stipulated if he is he'd figure pretty low due to the reasons I mentioned previously. I have no problem if he's considered a great, I havn't really thought about it as I don't tend to while fighters are active (unless its blindingly obvious that they are).

By the way, I say the same thing about Calzaghe. He doesn't figure highly due to competition not being great and most of his greatness is based on consistency too. BUT, he did fight one great fighter in Bernard Hopkins. If Wlad fought somebody as good as Bernard Hopkins I think based on last night he'd be exposed pretty horribly nevermind grinding out a SD win.

 

I disagree strongly with Tyson. He'd struggle with leverage and in the clinch all night as he did often. If Tyson was to win, it would be on a intensely boring, scrappy, close verdict.

Actually come to think of it, I think Tucker would beat Wlad.

 

Yes he is. he practically beat any fighter that was put in front him bar his 3 losses obviously. Will be interesting to see who he will fight next.

 

He has to be for all the reasons mentioned. He's dominated the division for a long, long time and beaten whoever has happend to be around. He has a couple of sloppy losses and no disputing that but why does that have to be a factor in it? Are you not allowed lose a fight anymore? The Purrity loss was two decades ago. He learned and grew and has become the man in the heavyweight division. 56-3 (49ko) is an exceptional record.

I don't really know what more he could have done

 

The Klitschkos have a very interesting record where they've never really been outboxed. Wlad was pounding the **** out of Purrity and Brewster before running out of gas and Sanders just caught him early. And Vitali was ahead on the scorecards for both of his 'defeats'.

I know you've got to look at them individually as well but that is really impressive for over 100 fights between them.

 

The fact that we have HW's who come to the ring for World title fights and carrying extra weight around the middle tells u everything. The bare minimum for any fighter is to be in shape.

 

I would say Wlad might be about the 15th best heavyweight ever now.